Hungary Citizenship Bill Irks Neighbor

Hungary’s Parliament Wednesday passed a bill granting dual citizenship to ethnic Hungarians in a move that has angered neighboring Slovakia and sparked warnings of a possible retaliation.

Hungary’s new center-right government, which scored a landslide victory in April’s general elections and is to be sworn into office Saturday, submitted the bill to Parliament in line with its election promises of easing the administrative process for getting Hungarian citizenship by foreigners born to Hungarian parents or with assumed Hungarian ancestry.

Citizenship will be awarded on a case-by-case basis and applicants will need to prove their knowledge of the Hungarian language, but won’t be required to live in Hungary.

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The bill, which the ruling Fidesz with its two-third majority passed in Parliament without any problems, could potentially matter to a conservatively estimated 2.59 million ethnic Hungarians living in neighboring Slovakia, Romania, Serbia, Ukraine, Austria, Croatia and Slovenia.

The number of Hungarians living in the countries is relatively large compared to the roughly 10 million inhabitants of present-day Hungary. The Treaty of Trianon, signed in 1920 after the end of World War I, cut off nearly two-thirds of the territory Hungary had previously controlled, leaving many ethnic Hungarians outside their homeland.

The citizenship issue further damages the already strained Slovak-Hungarian relations and may spark retaliation. Slovak officials have notified the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe, a regional security organization, of their concerns over the Hungarian dual-citizenship bill.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico Monday warned the 521,000-strong Hungarian minority, who make up 10% of the 5.4 million Slovak residents, they could lose their Slovak citizenship if they receive the Hungarian one. With general elections in the country a little more than two weeks away, the dual-citizenship issue has rocked the Slovak political scene.

“If the Hungarian Parliament passes the law, Slovakia will amend its citizenship act so that ethnic Hungarians would lose Slovak citizenship as soon as they are given Hungarian citizenship,” Fico told reporters before the Hungarian Parliament passed the bill.

Hungary will wait until the results of the Slovak elections to negotiate the subject, Fidesz head and Prime Minister-elect Viktor Orban said Tuesday, dismissing Mr. Fico’s remarks as part of his election campaign and calling it “provocation.”

Financial markets reckon Hungary should have other priorities than the dual-citizenship legislation. After one month in office, “Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s only real policy move has been to call for the introduction of dual citizenship for ethnic Hungarian in neighboring countries — without consulting Slovakia and Romania. This is hardly the country’s most important challenge these days,” said Preston Keat, Research Director at political risk research and consulting firm Eurasia Group in London.

“So far, Fidesz has been far from the modernizing type of a center-right party [like those of former Slovak Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda or current Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk] that markets were hoping for,” Keat added.

Margit Feher in Budapest and Leos Rousek in Prague contributed to this post.

Comments (5 of 21)

I cannot understand why Eastern Europeans can be so parochial . Who really care if one is Hungarian , Slovak ,or Roumanian ? Do you want to be European or you rather be a tribal society like in Afghanistan or Pakistan ?

1:58 pm May 29, 2010

i would rather have peace wrote:

This conflict could have been avoided if the EU had taken upon itself the task to mediate between the two parties. Despite continous appeals during the last five years by the Hungarian government, NGOs or citizens no international organisation or key regional power showed any sign of concern for the situation. After five years of ever more open anti-Hungarian Slovak policies and international disinterest, Hungary had to take the responsibility of making Slovakia understand that ethnic Hungarians in Slovakia are not unprotected or vulnerable and that at least Hungary will defend this minority from being forcedly assimilated through discriminative Slovak legislature.

3:57 am May 28, 2010

Salsa wrote:

Mr. @Romanian i think you are a diversionist not a romanian and you don't have the right to speak in the name of us.

2:02 am May 28, 2010

Slovak wrote:

I am happy to get my Hungarian citizenship beside my Slovak one. We Slovaks were Hungarians before the WW and all our ancientors had the Hungarian citizenship. It is absolutly normal to get back what is ours.
I think Fico - the Slovak prime minister- is only an extremist non-inteligent provocator.

1:58 am May 28, 2010

Romanian wrote:

The major problem is Slovakia in this region. This miniature state is based on Tiso's ideology. Tiso was a 2nd WW fascist leader and the Last Ally of Nazi Germany. He was sentenced to deathafter the war due to war crimes against Jews and Hungarians. Even today Slovakia has nazist laws like the decrets of Benes from 2nd WW or the new made Language Laws. Both are typical ethnic discriminations. In Slovakia today official only 10% of population is Hungarian but when they get the land from Hungary there were 30% Hungarians but many of them were "cleaned" (killed, jailed, banished). In Slovakia everybody has a mixed ethnic background due to the forced Slovakization.
As a Romanian I agree with the new Hungarian Citizenship Law and now I learn Hungarian to get my old-new citizenship.
I hope Europe will stop the extremist Slovak goverment.

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